Trust me

[shadeofdusk]

Hi everyone, here's a sketch of Alan that I did.

I was thinking specifically of the description of Alan looking so nice and trustworthy that you don't register that he's carrying a gun, but I can't find it :(.

Comments

[lemonsquid]

Heh, that's because Alan is 1) constantly looking trustworthy and 2) always carrying a gun. :D I think there's a couple of scenes where it's specifically mentioned-- the first chapter, when he convinces Jamie and Mae to come inside, sometime around the Goblin market, when he's trying to reassure them that nothing's all that weird, and the scene I think you might be thinking of is right before they're all about to have a Gerrard-torturing party. {:\

I love the colors you got in the clothes and in the shadows! Painterlyness is sexy. Really nice expression, too-- If he asked, I'd totally lend him $20. And only maybe because he was holding a gun.

Interested in concrit?

[shadeofdusk]

:sigh: I keep looking, but I'm starting to think I must've hallucinated it, or possibly read it in one of Sarah's interviews.

Concrit away if you like, though, as this sketch stopped thrilling me when I realized I had no clue where the hell he was standing (and there's an idea of Nick and Liannan I'm more interested in working on), I can't promise I'll go back and change much.

[lemonsquid]

Nick and Liannan! Awesome, can't wait

[lemonsquid]

ps- if you want revenge, man do I have a pile of images that could use someone else's redlining. Faces: UG.

[lemonsquid]

...Also, I think the phrase you're looking for is something like, "as if he weren't carrying six concealed weapons." You didn't hallucinate it! But I can't find it either.

[shadeofdusk]

Ah yes, I see what you did there. Am inclined to agree with you, though, the reasoning for the somewhat odd posture was that he's supposed to be shrugging, but :shrugs: if it doesn't work, it doesn't work.

I usually start out with a regular pencil sketch that I scan, so drawing issues aren't usually something I deal with on the computer, unless I change my mind about something, or decide it sucks.

Thanks for the reassurance. Between art school and the various freelance stuff I'm used to all crit having the 'fix it OR ELSE' implication, and not being like "yes, I will immediately go back into this and do everything you suggested" feels WRONG.

Glad you like the color--have you ever heard of a program called Painter that's put out by Corel? It's what I use, and is much better for painterly stuff than Photoshop.

[lemonsquid]

Friggin' Painter. Painter and I are like >:[ whenever I open it up. If you don't mind me asking, what's your usual workflow in that program? Flat colors first, or not at all...?

[shadeofdusk]

Aww, that's sad. I loves Painter. There is a bit of a learning curve (if you're used to the Adobe menus, it sometimes feels like they're hiding things as almost everything has a different name), and I did spend about a month forcing myself to use it for everything in order to learn the program.

I work pretty much the same as I do in Photoshop. Some sort of neutral for the canvas, then block in basic color shapes, than basic lighting, and slowly build up the detail. If I'm using a sketch that I scanned in, or line art that I drew digitally, that'll be in a separate layer, but a lot of times that gets either overdrawn, or erased. After a certain point I tend to find it gets in the way.

Is there anything in particular you want to know about/to do in Painter?

[lemonsquid]

Mostly, uh, how to paint, which you sort of answered-- do you have any in-progress drawings of just blocked color, or just basic lighting?

Also, I totally tried that only-Painter!-month. But I failed out by the third day, and have only done occasional (and deeply begrudging) forays into it, since then. It IS the friggin' menus-- and I don't like how the "paint" just mucks everything up (creates noise on the edge of the strokes, etc.) Do you use wet/dry layers? Which tool do you end up using? The Artist Oils seem too opaque to control; the watercolor; too translucent. Do you use the same medium and the same layer for the whole picture?

[lemonsquid]

Oh yeah, and what res do you usually work at in Painter? And do you use layers at all?

[shadeofdusk]

Yes, alright, let me think about what'd be the most helpful. I write tutorials for the program semi-regularly, so I have a few files that I've taken umpteen-billion screenshots of in progress, but they're in a variety of styles and not necessarily how I draw when left to my own devices. So something else might be better

[shadeofdusk]

Hey, on second thought, do you want to maybe take this to your personal journal, or email? I think we might be getting kind of far off topic.

[lemonsquid]

Sure! Thank you for the advice-- can we move this art-nerd chatter here?